For more information about the total solar eclipse on April 8, including where to watch, start time and events happening around San Antonio, check out our guide.
Given its location smack-dab in the center of the path of totality, the city of Kerrville, like other Hill Country communities, started planning for the April 8 total solar eclipse years in advance.
Good thing, because NASA chose Kerrville as one of the cities where it would broadcast live — the only city in Texas where the space agency is setting up shop.
Together with the city, NASA will host the Kerrville Eclipse Festival, a free event in Louise Hays Park with scientific speakers, live music, children’s programming and 4 minutes and 25 seconds of totality, all streamed live nationwide on NASA TV.
Because of that draw and its proximity to San Antonio, Kerrville is expected to lure tens of thousands, or perhaps hundreds of thousands of visitors. No one knows exactly how many people will visit, and estimates range wildly. The website Great American Eclipse estimates that as many as 488,000 people could descend on the city of 25,000 people on the day of the eclipse.
City and county officials, looking at data from similarly-sized communities in the path of totality during the 2017 eclipse, are estimating two to three times the county’s population of 50,000 people, or about 150,000 additional visitors, said Julie Davis, president and CEO of the Kerrville Convention and Visitor’s Bureau.
In Texas overall, where 12.8 million people live in the path of totality, geographer Michael Zeiler, who creates the maps and animation for the Great American Eclipse website, predicts anywhere from 270,000 up to 1 million more visitors could spend a long weekend in the Lone Star State, depending on the weather and other factors.
But no matter how many visitors arrive, they’ll all have one thing in common: spending.
“For our small businesses, it will be like having an extra holiday weekend this year,” Davis said.
Doing the math
UTSA economics professor Bulent Temel has been crunching the numbers. As Zeiler’s visitor estimate has gone up with increasing media attention, he said he’s also revised his economic impact estimates higher.
He believes Texas as a whole could see up to a $450 million direct impact from the long weekend. Like Kerrville officials, Temel used data gathered by states from the 2017 total eclipse.
“Nebraska and South Carolina provided pretty detailed good data for their eclipse tourism,” he said. Nebraska welcomed 708,000 visitors who left $127 million in the state, he said. South Carolina saw an even bigger impact, with 1.6 million visitors stimulating the economy by $269 million.
Factor in the multiplier effect, which Temel estimates as $2.29 generated for every dollar spent, and the indirect economic impact on Texas could hit the billion-dollar mark, he said.
Economist Ray Perryman, in a brief published earlier this week, estimated a similar statewide impact of $428 million. His slightly higher multiplier effect brings the indirect impact to an estimated $1.4 billion.
San Antonio, he estimated, would see a $63 million direct impact, according to Perryman, and as much as a $227 million indirect boost, while Kerrville could see an additional $2.5 million in spending, or $7.5 million total impact.
Temel thinks those indirect figures could ultimately be even higher long-term, as visitors who may have never been to Texas before decide to return at some point in the future.
Order early, order extra
Fredericksburg, with a population of 12,000, is expecting as many as 100,000 additional souls will pass through town, Fredericksburg Chamber of Commerce President Jim Mikula said.
In comparison, the city sees about 200,000 people come through during spring break — but that’s over a period of about two weeks, Mikula said. While Fredericksburg also formed a task force three years ago to plan for the eclipse, the city hasn’t created any public events; instead, word-of-mouth is filling beds.
Some small restaurants and shops will actually be closed on the day of the eclipse, he said, as owners worry that employees who aren’t local won’t be able to make it to work because of traffic jams. Those that plan to remain open, however, will be ready, he said.
Perryman estimated that, including “downstream/multiplier effects,” the overall Texas retail sector would see a $281 million boost, $222 million to short-term rentals and hotels and the restaurant business bringing in an additional $180 million.
Dawn Larios, executive director of the West Texas Region of the Texas Restaurant Association said its members are excited about the influx. They’ll be busy this Easter week, she said, but then will turn their attention to serving the hordes of eclipse tourists.
Larios praised big suppliers like Ben E. Keith, Cisco and U.S. Foods, which she said have been urging restaurants to order early and order extra to be prepared.
Especially after the difficult pandemic years and the last couple sweltering summers, she said restaurant operators are grateful for the expected eclipse bump.
“The excitement is huge,” she said. “And Texas is going to be center stage.”
